A little bit about me.....and the booze

Personal info

I'm a 40 year old English man who lives on the European mainland. I emigrated 1998 for the usual reason (other than work or being on the run).  As the name of this blog suggests, I work in the bar business: for 12 years as a barkeeper and for 3 years I've owned my own bar.

Drinking history

My parents had the bright idea of introducing my brother and me to alcohol "because that's what they do in France and the French kids don't reach the legal drinking age and turn into raving alcoholics". They forgot that we don't have any French genes.....

As a toddler I had one of chairs with wheels that are used to teach kids to walk. I soon got the hang of this and used to zoom passed my grandfather and steal his gin and it (gin with sweet vermouth: not exactly what the other toddlers in the neighbourhood were drinking, I'm sure).

As a teenager I was more into weed and getting stoned. Sure, I got drunk sometimes, but my friends and I were more interested in getting high and watching movies. Growing up in a small town we certainly saw a lot of fights caused by bored drunks at weekends but, until one of these guys put a glass in my neck, was never a victim of drunken violence. At the party I went to after I had 30 stiches put in, we stoners all agreed that alcohol was not the best drug...

When I was 20 I moved to London to study and suddenly felt lonely and friendless. On the first evening there I went to the bar at the end of the street and started meeting people. The pub became my refuge. The only people I knew were regulars and it became hard to stay away.

In my mid-twenties I met a German girl and moved away with her. The relationship didn't last long, mainly becuase I got a job in a bar and was more interested in partying. Not too much, only 7 nights a week or so. As I was always working I couldn't go out at the weekend like a normal person so work was the only chance I had to socialise and party. Once again, although I was on the other side of the bar, the regulars were my only friends and "friends".

Nowadays I don't drink often, maybe 2 or 3 times a week, but always too much. I can't simply have a beer or 2 to relax. I can tell myself a million times to stop after a couple but it's pointless. Something in my brain switches and I know that I will soon be drunk. That's why I don't drink as regularly. And the hangovers....10 years ago a couple of Aspirin and a quick puke would work and in a couple of hours I'd be skipping around like a lamb in springtime. These days I look too kaput to be an extra in a zombie movie.

So, enough of that. Let the diary begin!